Arabesque
by pandolfi
Summary: The sky is the same. The forest is the same. The lake is the same and the autumn weather is the same. The castle, however, is empty. Hermione is in a deserted Hogwarts, and she thinks that it's real. HBP spoilers.


**Arabesque**

…_fall. I think the leaves are red now. You'd love to see them…_

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She places her hand on the little square stone right below the inside windowsill. She likes the permanence of the small stone set in centuries-old mortar and her rough, calloused palm caresses its edges. So unlike everything else, she thinks.

A sudden cold comes and she hears whispers—_none, Professor..._ She lifts her hand from the stone as it scratches in the back of her head, wanting to be let out. She looks at her fingers, cool and papery white and thin, and they remind her of her mother's fingers when she touched her feverish forehead when she was a child.

She lifts her eyes up then, and she sees how the bed hangings fall, on the left bed and the right bed and her own bed; how the crimson velvet falls in pools on the floor because the length is too long and how there are little variations in the areas where the sun hits it. She wonders why she hasn't noticed it before, because there's been a week for her to notice things.

It's been a week, according to her little calendar she got from Ron last Christmas, and seven days is a long time to sit alone and read.

She thinks that she should go to breakfast and she walks to the door, still in her nightgown. A creak and the door opens; the hinges should be oiled but are not. Down a short corridor, the worn stone cold against the sensitive bottoms of her feet. The stairs approach, looming in the misty predawn light filtering in through a window high in the wall. She looks to either side as the first step draws nearer and notices that the candles in their wall brackets are burnt down and should be replaced.

Twenty-three stairs and her feet touch the softness of a rug. The weave feels nice against her feet and she lingers as she crosses it. The Common Room is empty and clean; every table and couch and chair exactly where it should be. No evidence of parties or late-night studying mar the perfect layout and for the first time in a week she feels vaguely disoriented by it.

But then she's at the back of the portrait and she pushes it open. The Fat Lady nods to her wearily. Even the paintings seem old and worn and despairing and she quickly walks by before the painting can inquire about the news. She thinks that there hasn't been any and won't be any in the future.

She turns right and comes to the moving stairs in their great vertical room. The system has been unreliable in the past week; how was she to know that it fed off the magic of those living in the castle? But she doesn't feel like taking the long way, past countless portraits that would stare and suits of armor whose helmets gape blackly and whose eyes, though hidden, are unavoidable. So she takes a tentative step onto the first step of the stairway and to her relief it starts moving downwards. On Tuesday she thought she saw someone on the edge of landing, in a ball and whimpering. But when she looked back the next second there was no one there and only the dust motes danced in the gauzy air.

Another problem, she muses as she steps off the staircase, is that the floors are never clean anymore. She doesn't know why; the elves are in the kitchen and apparently working at something. They still deliver the meals and light the fires and clean the classrooms and are yet preoccupied with something that makes her uneasy in a way that she can't describe. Shivers run successively up and down her arms, quick bursts of cold that make her hair stand on end.

She can't blame them, though. And then, walking of her own accord, she passes the open doors and steps into the Great Hall, and she sees the tables spread before her. Like every morning, even before the past week, they are laden with food, and like every morning the smells waft past her. She smells eggs and pumpkin juice and toast—perfect, never burnt, not even the last seven days have changed that—and then she looks around to see if anything _had _changed. The four great tables stretch in front of her in the empty hall, still decorated with banners and candles as if nothing was different. On a whim she looks up at the ceiling. It is black.

It suddenly makes sense to her as she seats herself at the end of the vacant Hufflepuff table, the closest one, and reaches for the croissants. The ceiling was enchanted by Dumbledore, which would make it obvious that he's gone, really gone. Some jam on a shining butter knife spread on the croissant and she bites it, savoring the buttery taste. Some things haven't changed; she's glad that this is one of them and then not glad, because she hears voices again—_…salad, Miss Granger? You'll like it; it even has nice cherry tomatoes in it from Greenhouse One…_

She pushes the scrabbling creature back with some exertion and determinedly reaches for the pumpkin juice, filling her goblet and drinking deeply. She knows that she can't give in to the voices because they would consume her, and so she resists. Her lips are warm against the cold goblet and she notices that it has a streak on its base.

She hums distractedly as she day-dreams and then turns her head by instinct, her clean brown hair falling around her shoulders as she looks up. It's post time; she's gotten used to it coming exactly now. She waits in a vague hopefulness for an owl to deliver something and even digs in her pocket for some Knuts in case the _Prophet_ comes. But nothing happens, and she turns back to her plate.

She eats more, some yogurt and cranberry muffins, until she's full and can't bear to see the tables full of uneaten food. As if by command she hears a crack, an elf-magic crack, and closes her eyes before opening them to see Dobby in front of her.

His skin is thin and she thinks she can see every artery running from his heart to his head through his neck. Tendons move beneath the skin, so obvious with the ribs protruding from the distended belly somehow. She thinks that he should be eating.

"Why aren't you eating, Dobby?" There's a kindness in her voice that she hasn't heard for a week, but perhaps that's because she hasn't spoken to anyone for a week.

"I is getting the Great Hall ready for the young masters. We must serve them, Miss Hermoininnie."

She doesn't flinch at the mispronunciation of her name and her hands dart downwards to press her skirt – newly pressed by some miracle - against her legs. "Dobby. Do you know where everyone is?" The question spills from her mouth accidentally; she waits for an answer nevertheless.

He gestures around him, his thin arms waving in the air, his bones sticking out at strange angles. His shadow behind him on the floor waves with him, his actions magnified tenfold. "Theys are right here in the hall with you, Miss Hermoininnie! Look at them, you must look and then you will see."

He pops away, leaving an empty space where he was, and she thinks that his outline still shimmers in the air for some time before fading. She looks at her watch and then pushes her plate away. A thought dances through her head that time means nothing now, that there's no schedule anymore, but she supposes that she's been on a timetable too long for it to fade away in seven days. So she gets up from the table, brushes the toast crumbs from her shirt

…_beat him up. There was blood all over the ground and Pomfrey says his nose is dislocated…_

For a second she thinks that noses can't be dislocated because they're cartilage, she read that in a medical journal a long time ago, and then she feels it rattling its restraining lock that comes ever closer to breaking. Walking on as if nothing had happened she looks up at the stained glass rose window over the Great Hall doors, thinking of real things: Harry, Ron, Hagrid, Snape. She can feel it retreating and senses a small flash of pleasure should occur at her success. It doesn't, and she keeps walking out the doors and onto the lawn.

She's been keeping track of the days in the calendar from Ron and it's Sunday now. According to the planner it's 'Sunday, October 16'. Below it she has written 'sit by lake' in blue ink and so she starts there. Every Sunday the lawn immediately outside the castle that borders on the lake is dotted by students lounging and trying to escape from the horrors of everyday life. She usually looks down on them from far away because they should be doing work, at least some of the time, not just throwing their friends into the lake and perhaps the embrace of the squid.

A part of her flies away when she realizes she can't, and she carefully smoothes her skirt before sitting on the grass.

The grass is green and still soft beneath her legs, though some dried strands brush the tender skin and makes it itch. She sits there for a while, sifting the fine dirt in the worn area by her left knee through her fingers. It's warm out and she can feel the sun washing pleasantly over her exposed arm. She thinks of nothing in particular, just the clouds and the castle and a Christmas service long ago with her parents. A cool wind from the east sweeps across her body and she shivers, the warmth of the sun dispelled as it hides beneath a cloud.

She thinks it would be a good time to go in because it's getting colder even though the sun still shines as brightly as ever. Standing up she hears her back crack, and then she walks towards the castle. Her footsteps are muffled by the grass and yet they are the loudest sound in her ears. She can't hear any birds or students, no flags rustling on the Quidditch pitch, only the rustling of the trees and the almost silent slap of water on shore.

Her feet move on autopilot up to her dormitory, where she sits on the bed which creaks below her. She knows that there's nothing else in her planner to do today and so she shrugs off her shoes and lies back. She's gotten used to the silence over the past week, even learned to appreciate the blanket of quiet that has fallen over the grounds. It gives her time to reflect, without any Arithmancy or Potions to occupy her time. The thought that she should be keeping up with her schoolwork flits through her mind and just as quickly evaporates as she closes her eyes and revels in the blackness under the lids.

The first day was, she admits to herself, not as she should have reacted. By the third day her curiosity had taken over, either of its own will or hers, and she succumbed to wanderlust. Hour after hour she had spent traversing the dusty and high corridors of Hogwarts. Having free reign of the library, poking around teacher's offices and making Potions she's sure she couldn't make if Slughorn was over her shoulder. But he wasn't, hadn't been at all because he was gone like the rest of them. After the fifth day, Thursday, she had felt hemmed in, and then the thing crouched in the back of her mind started to spring out. From its dark box built of pure _realness_ it regurgitated fragments of people, and after the first attack she theorized that if they kept happening the box would eventually fall apart.

As she drifts into sleep, she tells herself again that, despite her curiosity, she doesn't want that to happen.

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…_a nice blanket. See, dear, it even has hippogriffs on the sides like in your third year. Warm and…_

…_some light, I think? It's ever so much easier to read like this…_

…_all sniveling at his feet, it was hilarious. Things've gotten lots better since Snape left…_

…_must drink this. That's right, lift up your head—good, I'll be back with more…_

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She wakes up, vaguely hearing snippets of voices dying away in her head. They float away, wispy in the silence, and as hard as she tries to catch them they elude her. She opens her eyes, sighs, and swings her legs out of bed. Her hand reaches out to the bedside table and grasps for her wand. It's nice and solid in her sweaty palm, and she sets off for the Great Hall.

She arrives there to the welcoming scent of food seven minutes later. She carries neither book bag nor book as usual, for she hopes to eat and go to Dumbledore's office. As she spears a piece of chicken with the tines of her polished fork she thinks that there will be something in his private library that will explain everything away because Dumbledore knew everything.

She hears a distant yet roaring rumble and puts down the chicken on her plate. She looks up at the ceiling, half-expecting to see thunder. She gasps softly to herself as she sees the black shifting up and down, cloudy and misty in the nothingness of the illusion. She's slightly disturbed and yet turns back to her food, but only because there's nothing much else to do. Ten minutes afterwards she puts her silverware down neatly beside her plate, puts her napkin on the table, and steps over the long, empty bench. Its wooden legs scratch the stone floor and the sound resonates in the hall, and

…_storm. Hurt the Willow, it did. Hagrid'll have his work cut out for him when he…_

It always happens then, as if there's something different.

She doesn't think about it; she's given up thinking about it and just continues walking. It's become monotonous, the sound of her shoes walking in empty corridors. And then she comes to the long corridor that leads to Dumbledore's office. Even since his death she's thought of it as his office, and even though McGonagall had taken up residence there she had left his things untouched. She called it a memorial, or something like that; she never actually listened.

The gargoyle hiding the door to the office looms in front of her, its grotesque features peering at her with hatred, or maybe it's her who peers at it with revulsion. Her voice cracks as she says the password and she watches the statue move aside, revealing the ever-turning staircase.

The candles in this staircase were out too. Their drippings had been allowed to fall onto the stairs, staining them in a lacy pattern. She thinks it could be pretty if it didn't remind her of those drawings in his room, and then she stumbles in front of the open wooden door.

The vastness of the office overcomes her and she sits down in one of his squishy chairs. The fabric is scratchy under her legs; she's sure that it was different when he was alive. The stuffing is lumpy against her neck, making it awkward to sit, and so she stands up again, noting that his desk is as empty as

…_we know that you're having a hard time, but you have to come back. Harry needs help with his Potions. Without that book of…_

It comes again, leaving her changed. She thinks that its box is opening, or breaking apart, and will sometime fall apart into little pieces scattered across the darkness of the back of her eyes. They will pierce and hurt and yet she won't scream, because the pain will be real.

…_making the change now—hold her—…_

Her world tilts strangely sideways as she falls. It seems as though it's in slow-motion, the way Muggle films always make their dramatic parts. She sees the edge of the desk, the great carven lion's head sticking out of the side and roaring at her, its wooden mane flapping in

…_eyes twitching, hold her down, you _must_ hold her. This is not a time for being squeamish…_

the cold wind. Then for a moment she sees the hard stone floor, and she sees the feet of those who walked upon it. Strange

…_it's happening sometime in the next few seconds—you have to hold her, what did I tell you only a minute…_

flashes behind her eyes, back behind the feeling, and in that second she knows that the cage has broken and it let out. She feels it dancing beneath the surface, exulting in the newfound freedom. Ripping, tearing, until her vision turns to grey and then almost-dark, a deep purple swirling in, twisting and melding into the dance.

She sees blackness, or perhaps she sees nothing at all; everything is the same in the black of night and the cold air and the hard earth turning soft, and she whirls on the hill in the ocean as the wind whips her hair and the spray stings her lips. Salty and sweet and there's

…_go, fetch her and tell her that she's coming back. Go now! And…_

Before she thinks nothing at all, she tells herself that she was wrong, because it wasn't as bad as she had thought, and the pain she barely feels at all.

_...must close the window, the leaves are all blowing in…_

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She opens her eyes, not feeling the pain, and maybe there isn't any. She notices that she's on a bed in the Hospital Wing, the white sheets bright before her darkened gaze, and it feels as though she's been lying in the same position for a week. The dancing subsides and her newfound sight is met with a glass of green liquid being thrust before her eyes.

"Drink it. You'll need it before the night is over."

She does as she is told. As the medicine burns its way down her throat she notices that there's nothing behind her eyes making everything seem strange. She thinks it's nice, maybe ironic that she's finally alone, really alone, after a week.

And then she falls asleep.

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"_I think it's over—she's on the floor in Dumbledore's office. Not moving; I don't think she's breathing. There's some blood from her head on the desk."_

_A pause, and then speaking._

"_Master? I must congratulate you on an excellent performance… but…"_

_A pause, and then hissing._

"_Even you, my most trusted servant, must know what makes it all the sweeter; I cannot believe you so idiotic so as to not grasp the meaning."_

_A pause, and then whispering._

"_For it was truly real…"_


End file.
